


Lost

by natashasbanner



Series: Prompts [108]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Post-Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Post-Canon Fix-It
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-05
Updated: 2020-04-05
Packaged: 2021-03-01 01:08:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,027
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23486581
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/natashasbanner/pseuds/natashasbanner
Summary: What if Natasha woke up?For the prompt: Prompt: Post Endgame. Tony lives. What if when the snap was reversed Natasha actually woke up, but she died on an alien planet, so now she's without food, water, and no way to contact her family. How is she going to get home?
Relationships: Bruce Banner/Natasha Romanov
Series: Prompts [108]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/568204
Comments: 2
Kudos: 47





	Lost

**Author's Note:**

> This one's been in my inbox for almost a year. Hopefully it's worth the wait. Please enjoy :)

Natasha woke with a sharp intake of breath. 

She didn’t open her eyes right away, but instead mentally took stock of any injuries, but came to the conclusion that she was fine. She remembered falling, forcing Clint to drop her from the cliff, but she didn’t remember hitting the ground. 

Finally she opened her eyes and stared up at the strange atmosphere of the planet. Slowly, she sat up and looked up at the cliff she’d fallen from. She should be dead, there’s no doubt about it. But here she was alive and mostly uninjured. 

“Where the hell is that guy in the cloak when you need him?” Natasha muttered to herself, as she pushed herself up from the ground. 

She checked the comm panel on her suit, but it was cracked and completely busted and the device Tony had given them to navigate the quantum realm was gone. 

Panic began to set in as she continued to look around the baren wasteland of a planet she was trapped on. She was stranded on a planet with no life other than the floating “guardian of the stone” that she was almost certain wasn’t actually alive. There was nothing on this planet that could sustain life for any amount of time. Add to that fact that Natasha was almost a decade behind her timeline and everyone who knew she was here had presumably returned to their present under the assumption that she was dead. 

In short, Natasha was fucked. 

But the thing she didn’t understand is why she was still alive, or back from the dead in the first place. The cloaked guy made it clear, in order get the soul stone, you had to lose something you loved. It was permanent, yet here she stood. 

And what did that mean for the mission? Would they be able keep the stone if she was alive? 

Natasha shook her head. It was all too much and she needed to find a way off this planet. 

She looked back up the cliff and decided it was her best chance of finding a way home. She just had to figure out to get up there. 

That’s how she spent the better the next few hours trying to make it up the cliff to no effect. After her latest attempt she was completely exhausted. She dropped back onto the stone ground and stared up the face of the cliff. It mocked her with its sheer impossibility to scale even if she hadn’t been exhausted. 

She had to get the hell off this planet and climbing out was becoming less and less of an option. Frustrated, she pushed herself from the ground and started pacing. She just needed to focus and come up with a plan. She glanced at her cracked communicator, there was no hope of fixing it especially considering her desolate surroundings. 

She needed to find Tony’s device, it was her only hope of getting back to her own time. But first she needed to rest, try to recoup some of her energy before she became completely useless. If she weren’t on an alien planet the lack of food and water wouldn’t be a problem, she’d gone days at a time on missions hunkered down with no food and a limited supply of water. This place was different. 

Natasha laid down on the stone, looking up at the clouds over head. She wondered how the team was doing on Earth. Did they get the rest of the stones and bring everyone back? Were they mourning her presumed death, preparing a funeral? 

She shook her head, banishing the thoughts. They got the stones, there was no doubt in her mind and completed the mission. That’s all that mattered. Her eyelids grew heavy the longer she laid there until she couldn’t fight it any longer.

She drifted off think of the team getting back to their lives and everyone who’d been snapped away adjusting to the new world. It’s a comforting thought and before she knew it she was asleep. 

* * *

“You’ll have to return the stones to the exact moment they were taken,” Bruce reminded Steve as he stood on the smaller version of the platform they’d used to collect the stones in the first place. 

It had been almost a week since they’d brought everyone back and had the huge showdown with past Thanos. Everyone who’d disappeared five years ago was returned home and they got the job done. The world was healing, you could feel it in the air, but Bruce felt a crushing hole in his heart. 

Natasha was gone and Tony was in the hospital and it was up in the air as whether or not he was going to wake up. And on top of that, after Bruce snapped he’d lost Hulk while everyone was brought back. It had been a gradual loss as the battle went on and by the end he was just himself again. 

After he’d finally found the balance for them to coexist peacefully Hulk was gone, for good this time. For all the years he’d spent resenting the Hulk, he never expected to feel that loss as acutely as he was. 

Bruce felt lost. 

“You okay?” 

Bruce blinked a few times and looked up to see Steve watching him. His expression was soft, a complete contrast to the no nonsense look he wore a minute ago. 

He cleared his throat and adjusted a few settings on the control panel needlessly. 

“I’m fine.” He looked back up at Steve who was still looking at him like he might shatter at any moment. “Are you ready?” 

Steve stared for a moment longer before straightening up and setting his shoulders. “You sure you don’t want to come along?” 

“I’ve had enough time travel for the time being,” he said patting his arm the was in a sling, strapped against his chest. “Just get the stones back where they belong.” 

Steve nodded, his jaw set as Bruce initiated the quantum tunnel to open. After Steve disappeared Bruce started counting down the ten seconds it would take Steve to return. His attention was so focused on the panel and the throbbing pain in his arm, he didn’t realized that it wasn’t Steve who returned on the platform until he heard the gasps from Sam and Bucky. 

When Bruce looked up, his heart jumped into his throat and he almost dropped to his knees where he stood. Natasha was laying on the platform, her eyes were open and glazed over but she was breathing. 

Sam and Bucky were at her side before Bruce could move. 

“She needs a hospital,” Sam said, looking up at Bruce with a mixture of shock and panic in his eyes. 

Bruce shook himself out of his shock induced stupor and rushed over to the platform. 

“Get her to the car, I’ll drive,” he instructed, his tone leaving no room for argument. 

Sam lifted her from the platform and carried her to the car, Bruce right behind him. Over Sam’s shoulder, Natasha held a hand and Bruce reached out to hold her fingers. He held on until Sam sat her up in the back seat of Bruce’s car and buckled her in. 

Sam closed the door as Bruce fished the keys out of his pocket. 

“How is this possible,” Sam asked in a whisper, looking at Bruce with misty eyes. 

Bruce shook his head and climbed into the car. “I don’t know.” 

He typed the nearest hospital into the his GPS and sped away. A hundred questions running through his mind as he urged the car to go faster and faster. He wasn’t entirely convinced that the wasn’t an extremely vivid dream. 

“Bruce?” 

It came out as a hoarse whisper and Bruce looked in the rearview mirror to see Natasha watching him. Her eyes were a little more focused while she was slumped against the door. 

“Don’t try to talk,” he said softly. “Just rest, we’re almost to the hospital.” 

She nodded and rested her head against the window.

Bruce pulled right up to the emergency room doors and got Natasha out of the car as carefully as he could and took her inside. After talking to the triage desk, they rushed her into the ER and Bruce was led to a waiting room. He sat there alone for what felt like hours spiralling in his own head. 

All the questions he’d pushed aside on the drive to the hospital came flooding back until Bruce felt like he might hyperventilate. 

How was this possible? Was the most pressing one. Clint had said the trade for the stone was permanent, a soul for a soul. Unless when Bruce tried to bring her back when he snapped actually worked, but that was crazy. 

Bruce’s head hurt by the time someone finally came to find him in the waiting room. 

“How is she?” he asked, jumping up from his seat. 

“She’s resting,” the doctor told him. “She was dehydrated and has a some superficial injuries but she should make a full recovery.” 

Bruce breathed a sigh of relief and dropped back into the waiting room chair. “Thank you.” 

“Her room’s at the end of the hall,” she said, “last door on the left.” 

He nodded and she left the room. Bruce just sat for a long time before he pushed himself to his feet. He made his way down the hall and knocked on the open door before stepping inside. 

Natasha turned her head from where she’d been looking out the window. 

“Hey,” he said softly and pulled a chair over to the side of her bed. 

“Hey.” 

Her voice was stronger than it had been in the car, some of her color had returned too. 

“How are you feeling?” 

“Better,” she said and reached her hand out from under her blanket to squeeze his fingers. 

Bruce turned his hand over so he could lace their fingers together. Feeling her calloused palm against his and hearing the steady beat of her heart from the monitor grounded him, made that dream-like haze that fogged his mind since she’d appeared on the platform begin to fade. He was left with the startling, gut wrenching reality that Natasha was there, right across from him, very much alive.

“We thought you were dead,” he admitted, rubbing his thumb over the back of her hand. 

She chuckled softly. “I was, but then I woke up.” 

“If we knew you were still out there, we would have come sooner.” 

“I know.” 

They sat in silence for a long time, the rhythmic beeping of her heart monitor the only sound in the room. He noticed Natasha’s fighting her heavy eyelids and brought their joined up to kiss the back of her hand. 

“You should get some sleep,” he said and tried to let go of her hand but she held on tight. 

“Don’t go.” 

Her eyes were closed but her grip was tight, not that he planned on going anywhere anytime soon. 

“The others are going to want to know you’re okay,” he whispered. 

“Tomorrow,” she muttered, but it was barely audible over the sound of the monitor. 

He kissed her knuckles again and held her hand in his lap as she finally lost the battle with sleep. He watched her for a while, still not entirely convinced this wasn’t all in his head, before leaning back in his chair and closing his eyes. 

Tomorrow this room was going to be filled to the brim with the rest of the team the second they found out that she was alive. He thought about telling them tonight, but figured Natasha needed more time to rest before she faced everyone. He was slowly losing his own battle with sleep and squeezed Natasha’s hand one last time before he let his own exhaustion take him. 

“Please don’t be a dream,” he whispered into the quiet room before drifting off. 

And to his surprise, when he opened his eyes the next morning she was still there, their fingers still loosely linked in his lap. He smiled to himself and that hole he’d felt in his heart started to mend. 


End file.
